C&TS Shop Program: Is it odd, or just me?

Abbreviated Summary of the Winter Shop Work

At the end of last season, 487 was plugging along with "it needs some running gear work" and (I think) a leaky tender tank. After tearing down 487 and cleaning up 463/497, the shop crew got layed off. After coming back, fixing the running gear and the related seasonal work on 487 has taken all winter. In addition, 484 got sliced apart (again), 489 got stripped of it's wheelset, and 463/497 got put away semi-permanently.

Antonito's been busy with Tender and car maintenance, although I'm pretty sure that at least some of the tenders will still need work next year.

I think that's mostly what's gone on through the end of March 2003, isn't it?

2003 Season

So, in June, there will be good ole 487 steamed up with about 7 months worth of labor, but usable only for June 12th through mid-October (about 4 months total). After this, it'll get parked till it gets completely stripped, tested, and re-certified. Seems like this has taken 484 over four years. It appears that it'll take 489 at least two years for this work to happen (part of this winter, all of next). In any case, 487 is gone after this year.

484, on the other hand, will be ready in July for a full five years of service. Now that I think of it, apparently it sacrificed an axle/wheelset to 487 -- does that mean that 487 has to come apart to give it back, or will 489 sacrifice an axle to 484?

So, 484 will be the only locomotive available to the C&TS in 2004, with 489 maybe coming to life in mid-summer (maybe?). I've been told that rebuilds last around 5 years, is this still true with the FRA rules change? If so, then 484 goes away after 2007.

Shop History

So it looks like the C&TS has generally taken 2+ calendar years to rebuild a locomotive. The winter maintenance on a working locomotive apparently takes 4 to 5 months. If you take this as actual best performance, then you can predict a timeline for the productivity of the shop.

I have based my timeline on the "using all of the available shop labor in Chama" scenario we've seen the last few years. That's been a reported limitation I've heard from both the shop folk in person, and the various reports by management and the Commission.

In recent history, the existing shop has been able to almost complete a rebuild on one locomotive, while keeping a couple of others going, in a normal winter shop season. When they've had more than two operable locomotives go into a winter shop season, they haven't gotten a rebuild completed in less than two years. I've heard on this board and in person that locomotives need to go in for a complete overhaul every five years or so.

A Locomotive Schedule

If you factor in the shop history described above, you get the 10 year plan below.

The first block Operable shows which locomotives run in which year. You'll notice that I've just kept K-36 locos in the schedule, since everybody contends that it's easier to work on one series rather than two (or three) and they have the most reliable operational record. The locomotives marked with an asterisk (as in "484*") arrive during the summer season (like 484 is projected to this year).

The Shopped block lists those locomotives which are in the shop for annual maintenance rather than a complete rebuild. Note that this and the Rebuild list shows those locomotives in the shop for the winter before the operable season (i.e., 487 and 484 are in 2003's Shopped and Rebuild lists).

The Rebuild block lists those locomotives which are in the shop for a complete rebuild (including the FRA boiler certs, etc.). It's clear that the existing shop (labor and facilities) can't really rebuild more than one unit at a time, for multiple reasons.

The Storage block lists those locomotives that are stored inoperable. Note again that K-27 and K-37 locomotives never leave this list, and there is always one K-36 stored as well.

             C&TS Ten Year Locomotive Schedule
         2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Operable  487  484  484  484  484  489  483  488  488  487
          484* 489* 489  489  489  483  488  487  487  484
                    483* 483  483  488  487*      484* 489*
                              488*
Shopped   487  484  484  484  484  489  483  488  487  487
                    489  489  489  483  488  487  484  484
                         483  483  488
Rebuild   484  489  483  488  488  487  487  484  489  489
Storage   463  463  463  463  463  463  463  463  463  463
          483  483  487  487  487  484  484  483  489  488
          488  487  488  492  492  492  489  489  492  492
          489  488  492  494  494  494  492  492  494  494
          492  492  494  495  495  495  494  494  495  495
          494  494  495  497  497  497  495  495  497  497
          495  495  497                 497  497
          497  497

Effects of Locomotive Shortage

You can see from the chart that except for 2007, you never have more than three locomotives, and often have only two. I've heard many say you really need five locomotives to be safe and secure. Four seems like the recent "recommended minimum" and three is what we've had -- we all know what that's meant to ridership and reliability. With only two, the RGRPC and Commission seem to think they can run about 30,000 tickets; less than half of what was predicted for 2001. This has got to impact the operational bottom line in various and serious ways.

The Bottom Line

The bottom line is this: the C&TS must increase their shop capacity (and productivity). Until this is done, we can plan on never having a spare locomotive, never running triple headers, never having a full season without a canceled train, and never increasing ridership.

In addition, you can kiss 463 (the only K-27) and all the K-37's goodbye. They'll never make the rotation, since they require different maintenance and operational policies.

Like I said, I'm definitely not picking on the existing shop crew. They're great to be around, hard working, and key to continued operation. The problem is there aren't enough of them. The C&TS MUST INCREASE SHOP CAPACITY.

Action Items

I'd like to ask the C&TS Commission and the RGRPC to:

• outline their plan for avoiding the situation I've described above
  
• publish and successfully stick to a locomotive repair schedule
  
• document the financial plan for the repair schedule
  
• document the staffing plan for the repair schedule
  
• document their funding request plan for the repair schedule
  

I know my conclusions may not be even 80% accurate, but I'd be surprised if anyone can challenge the overall result. I'd like to hear from people like John Bush and other former staffers who managed to get more than four locos up at once. I'd also like to hear from people-who-know and then revamp this schedule with corrections to the time-to-rebuild, the rebuild interval, etc.

With Extreme Respect and Sincerity,


Tom Stewart, ughtas@gvtc.com